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Show I T&e Salt Laltf Tribone. Jurny 3, f??6 Conversion to Metric System Still Inching7 Along 9 Frank Brunsman Tribune Staff Writer It was during the sizzling summer of 1960 that the highest officially recorded temperature in Salt Lake City hit 108.6 degrees. The July 26 airport Fahrenheit reading expressed metrically was a brisk sounding 41 degrees Celsius (formerly ceiled centigrade). That July also saw the record for consecutive days above 100 degrees (38 C. nine days from July 14 to 22 for Celsius) followed by a 95 and then six more days of 100 or better. Arid, If it makes you feel cooler this season, you can think metric, but the nation's conversion to the metric system appears to be Just Inching along. Decade ta Accept Metrics The Metric Conversion Act made into law two days before last Christmas gives the United States a decade to accept metrics to keep in step with most of the rest of the worid. Strange things, for example, are in prospect for a Salt Lake City supermarket, doctors office rad dress shop. In the food store, a young man (weakling, you say) asks for help carry mg a bag of kitty litter to the checkout stand. Ita weight: 20. The medic sounds a little blotto. He's outlining a diet for a patieot who tips the scales at 100. Its a slimming plan. By In the dress salon, a chic matron who prided herself for years on staying at size 12 now is trying on evening dresses marked size 40. Metric Equivalents If youre up on metrics, youll know the man with the kitty litter is buying a sack 44 pounds. The overweight patient weighs 100 kilograms the metric equivalent of 220 pounds. And, the woman in the dress shop now wears a metric size 40 centimeters. Metrics, important to Utah businessmen because of foreign exports, are simple and logical because they're built on blocks of 19, os has been our monetary system since 1792,. an official of the Salt Lake Area Chamber of Commerce said. Peter S. Cooke, director of government affairs for the chamber, a nominee by the Utah congressional delegation and a governor on the United States Metric Board, now being formed, said that a big reason for delay in national metric conversion is that everyone is waiting on this board and what the federal government will do, especially in financing. He says, as a rough estimate, Utahns may be dealing almost wholly with metrics within five years. d While metrics are simple, he adds, the customary system of measurement is marked by illogic and complexity. For example, our foot ruler represents the . strides in preparing Utahns for ent$Y into tb metric age. misunders Using a Fshmiheit-Celsiu- s his theme in the short story (A tandin Days Walt," Ernest Hemingway graphical9 ly illustrates the problem through year-oiSchatz fever. a with sick is who Schatz listens intently when the doctor teiis Schfttzs father his temperature is 102. Lies Silently to Bed After the doctors visit, the boy 'lies feet. silently ta his bed staring at his Nothing the father does interests the boy. Finally the child has the courage to ak, About bow long will it be before I die? Convincing Schatz be isnt going to die is not easy as he has recently returned Ito the United States from school in France where the boys had told him you cant live witij.a length of King Edgars foot The yard was the distance from this English kings nose to the tip of the middle finger of his outstretched arm. As acre was the amount of land that could be plowed in a day by a yoke of oxen. George Blessing, Utah director for the U S. Department of Commerce, points cut that the European Economic Community has decreed that all, imports must be measured in metrics by 1978. Regarding some of the basic metric' units, lie said a meter is equivalent to 1.1 yard, a liter to 1.06 quarts and a gram weighs a little more than a paper clip. The common prefixes cent! is used: milli is and kilo is one thousand times. Sstiac Cauitaais Measures Some common measures Utahns may encounter in the not too distant future include 509 grams of butter or coffee converted from 1.1 pounds, an 80 kilometer speed limit rather an 50 miles per hour, four liters for 1.06 gallons and five milliliters rather than a teaspoon. The Celsius temperature scale uses zero as the freezing point of water, 100 the boiling mark. 'Authorities say that onae America gets metricized (Great Britain began a changeover in 1965), the only likely holdouts will be the Sultanate of Brunei, the Union of Burma and the Republic of Liberia. Mr. Cocke says schools are making groat d th fever of 44. t He had been waiting to die all day, ever since nine oclock to the morning. You poor Schatz, poor old Schatz. Its like miles and kilometers. You arent going ta die. Thats a different thermometer, On that thermometer 37 is normal. On this kind it's 98.1 r- Hemingway concludes his short stbrt! Oh, Schatz said. But his gaze at the foot of the bed relaxed slowly. The hold over himself relaxed too, finally, and the next day it waa very slack, and be cried very easily at little things that were of no importance. 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